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Print Edition StoriesWednesday, June 10, 2009
Holyoke targeted for green data center
By Mass High Tech staff
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A coalition of universities and tech companies plans to build an energy-efficient, high-performance computing center in Holyoke, supporting the state’s tech sector and academic institutions.
Massachusetts Secretary of Housing and Economic Development Greg Bialecki this morning confirmed published reports saying that Holyoke has been selected as the site for the proposed data center that will be managed by the University of Massachusetts Amherst, MIT, Boston University, EMC Corp. and Cisco Systems Inc. The four organizations are said to have agreed to participate in a four-month planning project.
Governor Deval Patrick said of the plans, “The potential for breakthrough technologies and research is enormous, and both the center and collaboration will undoubtedly serve to lift up the City of Holyoke and regional economies throughout Western Massachusetts.”
"It's a tangible example of the type of collaboration we're trying to facilitate," said Greg Bialecki, State Secretary of Housing and Economic Development."The governor is talking about the state having a lot of economic development potential that isn't widely recognized, and here you've got industry and academic leaders who could go anywhere in the world who are locating themselves in the Pioneer Valley."
A formal announcement is planned for Thursday in Holyoke, where the parties will sign a letter of intent to collaborate on developing a proposal, according to Robert Connolly, a spokesman for UMass president Jack Wilson, who helped to launch the initiative through discussions with MIT president Susan Hockfield.
An EMC spokesman said the first step will be to create an action plan with the ultimate goal of building a “world-class green research high-performance computing center” in Holyoke and forming the statewide research agenda.
The EMC spokesman said the collaboration was one of the key recommendations of the Governor’s Readiness Project, which EMC’s CEO and president Joe Tucci chaired. “As the leading information technology company headquartered in Massachusetts, EMC not only relies on an innovative, skilled workforce, but encourages innovation to create new jobs and drive economic growth in the state and around the world. The Holyoke High-Performance Computing Center (HPCC) will support both these objectives,” he said.
The western Massachusetts city reportedly was selected because of its proximity to high-speed data lines running along the Massachusetts Turnpike and U.S. Route 91 as well as available hydroelectric power from the Connecticut River.
The Boston Globe quoted MIT vice president for research Claude R. Canizares as saying the center would be a resource for various universities involved in areas such as climate modeling and biotechnology, but that the clean power source would make the center’s energy use cost effective.
The Holyoke project is noteworthy because it represents academic-private sector collaboration in information technology, said Michael Goodman Director of Economic and Public Policy Institute at UMass Donahue Institute. He said only 12 percent of IT companies report having licensing agreements of the type that are common in the life sciences field. “I was quite struck that collaborations aren’t as prevalent in IT,” said Goodman.
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